darkoshi

I've always had trouble using this vacuum cleaner on certain rugs. It gets so much suction on those rugs, that it sticks to them and makes it hard to push or pull the vacuum. But lately, I've had trouble vacuuming the other rugs too. Sometimes, it looked like the brush-roll wasn't turning.

So I replaced the wide belt (the vacuum has 2 belts - one wide and one narrow), and that seems to have fixed the problem. On the normal rugs, at least. The difficult rugs are still difficult, but not as bad as before changing the belt.

The old belt still looked to be in fine condition - no cracks and it didn't seem loose. But when comparing it to the new one, it was somewhat bigger / more stretched out.

This is a good video showing how to replace the belts. However, the guy in that video makes putting the new belt on look so simple, though actually it can be quite difficult to stretch the belt over the wheel.

I finally managed it as follows.
I wore gloves to protect the skin on my fingers.
First, slide the belt over the back metal pin.
Then pull the belt over the top part of the wheel as much as possible.
Then while holding the belt in place on the top of the wheel, turn the wheel slightly clockwise while pushing the belt over the bottom of the wheel.

For a while I was using a hex driver to try to push the belt down towards the bottom of the wheel, as my fingers didn't fit down there easily. I don't remember if I was still using the hex driver, or just my fingers, when I finally succeeded.

Once the belt is on the wheel, push at it until it is centered on the wheel.
Make sure the belt is still positioned correctly on the back metal pin too.